Dec. 3 (Bloomberg) -- German Social Democrats pressing to
gain control of the Finance Ministry in Angela Merkel’s next
government consider the battle to be lost, two party officials
with knowledge of the matter said.

The SPD leadership has given up on taking the ministry, the
officials said on condition of anonymity because cabinet posts
have yet to be made public. That effectively cedes the finance
post to Wolfgang Schaeuble as he has the backing of Merkel’s
Christian Democrats to stay in the job. SPD spokesman Tobias
Duenow declined to comment when contacted by phone in Berlin.

Jockeying over ministerial jobs is only now emerging as SPD
leaders step up their campaign to govern with Merkel on the
basis of a joint platform published Nov. 27. With a ballot of
SPD members under way that could yet sink the coalition deal,
Merkel and SPD leader Sigmar Gabriel have said they’ll announce
cabinet posts after the result is known on Dec. 14 or Dec. 15.

“We will get broad support,” Gabriel said in an interview
with ZDF television broadcast late yesterday, citing “a great
deal” of grass-roots support for the so-called grand coalition.
The Finance Ministry is “one of the most important” government
departments, he said. “But whether we take it and, if we do,
with whom -- we’ll decide that when this matter has been decided
within the SPD.”

Nine days before the deadline for 475,000 SPD members to
vote on the coalition pact with Merkel’s Christian Democratic
bloc, SPD officials are touring the country to sell the deal as
polls suggest the party membership is warming to the idea. Three
surveys published Dec. 1 suggest that at least 70 percent of SPD
voters back the accord.

‘A Lot More’

“Many members are concluding that we won a lot more
concessions than expected” in the coalition talks, Florian
Pronold, a member of the SPD’s national executive board, said
yesterday in a phone interview. He predicted “unequivocal
support” for the policy blueprint the two sides concluded.

National SPD leaders are addressing at least 23 regional
chapter meetings this week to lobby party activists and dispel
misgivings about serving as Merkel’s junior partner for a second
time since 2005, according to the party’s website. That compares
with nine last week. Gabriel is due to speak to SPD members in
Hamburg at about 7:30 p.m. today.

A key selling point is Merkel’s pledge to phase in an
hourly minimum wage of 8.50 euros ($11.50) as demanded by the
SPD during this summer’s election campaign. Concessions to the
SPD also include allowing some workers to retire early with full
benefits at age 63, down from 67.

Policies vs Personnel

Merkel said last week that she has discussed cabinet posts
with the SPD leader. Both she and Gabriel say they won’t talk
about jobs so that the referendum focuses on policies and not
personnel. Der Spiegel reported this week that the party leaders
have decided on the cabinet make-up.

Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the former SPD foreign minister in
Merkel’s first term whom Spiegel says is likely to return to the
same post, signaled that Schaeuble might be staying in his job.
While “we don’t yet know precisely” the distribution of top
jobs, “it’s completely clear the Union party would want to
fight to retain the finance portfolio,” he said in a Dec. 1
interview with Deutschlandfunk radio.

The Social Democrat ballot is extending uncertainty about
the leadership of Europe’s biggest economy, 10 weeks after
Merkel defeated the SPD in elections and claimed a third-term
mandate. Ballots have to reach SPD headquarters in Berlin by
midnight Dec. 12 and the party plans to present the result by
Dec. 15.

Opinion Polls

Seventy-five percent of SPD supporters favor ratifying the
deal with Merkel’s bloc and 18 percent are opposed, according to
an Infratest poll for ARD television published Dec. 1. The Nov.
28-30 poll of 1,000 people has a margin of error of as many as
3.1 percentage points.

The coalition was backed by 78 percent of SPD supporters in
a Nov. 27-28 Forsa poll of 1,001 people for the Welt am Sonntag
newspaper, which gave no margin of error. Neither poll specified
whether the SPD supporters surveyed were party members.

SPD membership surged during the buildup to the party
ballot. About 2,500 people joined in October, compared with a
monthly average of 1,000, according to the SPD’s media service
in Berlin. Another 1,772 joined through Nov. 13, the cutoff date
for eligibility to vote on the coalition contract.

At least 20 percent of SPD members have to participate for
the ballot to be valid. A “no” vote would force Merkel to
court the Greens party for an unprecedented national alliance or
call fresh elections. It would return the SPD to opposition to
build toward the next election in 2017.

“There’s a lot of activity in the days ahead,” Pronold
said. “We’re going to fight for every vote.”